Photos like that just tear my heart out, it's the same with that photo by Kevin Wilson which I'm not going to post because everyine knows it.

One that got to me that was posted on one of the photo comps a few months ago. The story behond it gives it impact:

Annabel wrote:Probably doesn't mean much on its own but it is one of the strongest images in terms of personal meaning for me.

It was Mumbai. It was very very hot. I was trawling the bazaars looking for bric-abrac to buy and take back to give as gifts to friends in the UK.

The girl on the right is a beggar. She followed me for a good half hour through, persistently dogging me for money or food. I refused, with hard-earned tourist thick-skin. But she persisted.

Finally, I drew tired of her cries, of her appeals. I gave her the remains of a tub of ice cream I had scoffed, almost as a 'go away , nice try, here's some food, piss off'.

She looked at the ice cream, then disappeared into the street with it in her hand. I followed her surreptitiously, curious. She called out 'Bhaiya, Bhaiya'- - meaning Brother, to -a boy some way back in the street, her brother. When he came, they became oblivious to everything around them. In the middle of traffic, they stood eagerly sharing the scraps of ice cream. The glee on their faces made me feel elated and guilty to the same intense degree.

The contrast beween what I expected and what was reality, between my adult's search for spurious trinkets and her child's search for food, made me jolt my views upright.

I had to take the picture as a reminder to myself : stay soft-hearted, it's better than the contrasted view of toughness that is actually quite hard to project.

She never came back to find me. I often wonder what she is doing, at this very moment.

blindswelledrat wrote:A bit controversial, but regardless of your thoughts on her, noone can deny that her life was dedicated to the country.I found this picture of the Iron Lady crying as she left downing street quite an evocative one:

These images get to me because we never talk about the firebombing that was done in Japan only Dresden. Tokyo was mainly wooden structures so the whole city was razed. This is why modern Tokyo is such an eclectic mix of buildings with very few old buildings.

There's nothing like a big dose of how powerful nature is to put things in perspective for me and stop me over-worrying about things that ultimately are the blink of an eye. Mountains, surf, all that stuff reminds me how small 'we' are really.

Not the one I was looking for, which had more aircraft in it, but, from

A German private's view wrote:At first I was rather depressed, of course. I, an old soldier, a prisoner of war after a few hours of the invasion. But when I saw the material behind the enemy front, I could only say, "Old man, how lucky you have been!"

And when the sun rose the next morning, I saw the invasion fleet lying off the shore. Ship beside ship. And without a break, troops, weapons, tanks, munitions and vehicles were being unloaded in a steady stream.

"In 1936, he became known across the globe for a photo (known as the "Falling Soldier" photo) presumably taken in Cerro Muriano on the Cordoba Front of a Loyalist Militiaman who allegedly had just been shot and was in the act of falling to his death. There has been a long controversy about the authenticity of this photograph. A Spanish historian identified the dead soldier as Federico Borrell García, from Alcoi (Alicante). This identification has been disputed; in fact there is a second photograph showing another soldier falling exactly on the same spot.[4][5] According to the Spanish newspaper El Periodico, the photo was taken near the town of Espejo, at 10 kilometres from Cerro Muriano, proving that the photo was staged [6][7]. In 2009, a Spanish professor published a book titled Shadows of Photography, in which he alleged that the photograph could not have been taken where, when or how Capa and his backers have alleged."

There is a lot of talk about that. I believe it wasn't staged and the evidence is the guys left hand. Just seen below his left thigh. The hand is curled, if you are falling it is almost impossible to not put your hand out to help break your fall. The hand is curled because the guy has just been shot in the head and is on his way to the ground dead/dying.

I think it's pretty horrible how uncomfortable the young chap with the gun looks. I think we imagine the Nazis as being monstrous but sometimes forget that a lot of them were simply too scared to resist their superiors.

Disastrous wrote:I think it's pretty horrible how uncomfortable the young chap with the gun looks. I think we imagine the Nazis as being monstrous but sometimes forget that a lot of them were simply too scared to resist their superiors.

Interesting, your point is a good one, but in this instance I wouldn't have said he looks in the slightest bit uncomfortable, more totally unmoved and nonchalant.